78 Account of Infer Iptions cRfcovcred on the Walls of

Northumberland, who, as appeared by the coroner's inqueft, mot himfelf in the Tower, June 21, 1585. " This earl, as Collins in- forms us, was fufpecled to have platted fccretly with Francis Throckmorton, Thomas lord Paget, and the Guifes, for invading England, and fetting the queen of Scots at liberty, whom he al- ways highly favoured. Whereupon, being foon committed to the Tower, and there kept prifoner, he, an Monday, June 2,1, 1585, was found dead in his bed, fhot with three bullets near his left pap, from a dagge or piftol, his chamber door being barred on the infide. The coroner's inqueft having viewed the body, considered the place, found the piftol, with gunpowder in the chamber, and examined his man, who bought the piftoL and him that fold it, gave their ver- dict that he had killed himfelf. The third day after there was a full meeting of the peers of the realm in the ftar chamber, where fir Thomas Bromley, lord chancellor, briefly declared, that the earl had been engaged in traiterous defigns, and had laid violent hands upon himfelf, being terrified with the guilty confcience of his of- fence ; and the attorney and folicitor general fhewed the reafons why the earl had been kept in prifon." Notwithftanding this weight of evidence Camden has hinted, and that pretty broadly, at fome fufpicions of foul play on this occasion, in the fallowing words : " Certe boni quam plurimi turn quod na- tura nobilitati faveant, turn quod prasclaram fortitudinis laudem re tumTet, tantum virum tarn mifera et miferanda morte periifle in- doluerunt. Quae fufpicaces profugi de ballivo quodam ex hattoni famulis, qui paullo ante comiti cuftas adhibitus, muffitarunt, ut parum compertum omitto, nee ex vanis auditionibus aliquid in- texere vifum eft." So that, though we cannot apply the well known lines of Gray, " Ye towers of Julius, London's lading ftiame, With many a foul and midnight murther fed !" 8 they